


we'll dance under sparkling lights

by littleluthor



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, Angst, Eventual Smut, F/F, Fluff, Lena Luthor Needs a Hug, Light Angst, Sorta Enemies to Lovers, cozy small town christmas au, lena rediscovers her childhood, nothing but happy endings in this house pls don’t worry, was planning to write fluff but this ended up kinda angsty
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-01
Updated: 2020-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:42:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27834733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleluthor/pseuds/littleluthor
Summary: cheesy hallmark christmas au but make it GAY and kinda sad
Relationships: Kara Danvers & Lena Luthor, Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
Comments: 12
Kudos: 150





	we'll dance under sparkling lights

**Author's Note:**

> I meant to post this yesterday so I've just dated it back to December 1st and we can pretend I posted on time <3
> 
> I've been wanting to write something about Lena and her birth family for a while, to just kinda explore the memories she may have and the people who may have loved her in her life before the Luthors, so here it is, draped in twinkling lights, filled with lesbianisms and a little sadness!
> 
> I hope you're all keeping safe and well, and I hope you all enjoy!

“Miss Luthor, I’ve arranged for the tree to be delivered directly into the lobby and then assembled by the front desk where we decided upon earlier this week. A team will be arriving during the night to decorate, I’ve had all of the ornaments and lights sent up from storage, as well as the newly purchased baubles. The catering team will be here first thing in the morning, by which point the preparations will be complete and we will be ready for the donation drive to begin.”

“Perfect Jess,” Lena tells her assistant, shuffling through the overwhelming stack of paperwork on her desk. “Thank you so much.”

It takes another few moments for her to realize that said assistant is still lingering watchfully in the doorway. Eager to get this over with and return to her seemingly endless work, Lena glances up from the desk and raises a questioning eyebrow in her direction. 

“You know, you could almost fool me into thinking that you enjoy the holidays,” Jess starts, taking a few steps into the office. “What with wanting the perfect tree, the prettiest baubles, matching tinsel, the twinkliest lights.”

“It’s for the children, Jessica.”

“Mhm.” She nods, entirely unconvinced. “Whatever you say, Lena.”

“Can we do this later? I’d like to get home at a reasonable hour tonight.”

An unexpected laugh bursts free from her assistant before she says, “Okay, now I _know_ you’re just trying to get rid of me.”

“I’m not—”

“You haven’t been home at a reasonable hour _once_ in the three years that I’ve known you.”

“Fine,” Lena sighs her admission, setting down her pen with a quiet _clink_ on the desk. There’s been a tight band of stress squeezing around her brain for the last few hours, only worsening as the sky darkens outside the office windows. “I received a call earlier today, it was a lawyer who works in Midvale.”

“Where the hell is that?”

“It’s the town where my mom was born, it’s a tiny place, you wouldn’t know it unless you already knew it. Anyway, she called and said that, well, apparently I had an aunt.”

“Okay.”

“She passed away, and it seems that she left everything to me. Her home, her car, her jewellery, virtually everything she ever owned. So now I have to travel down there to deal with it and I have so much work to do here already, I can’t just take time away. I’m really stressed and I don’t feel like talking about it.”

“It’s not good to keep everything buried though,” Jess reminds her. “You need to take a break and figure out what you’re going to do about it, if you don’t then you’ll feel even more stressed. There’s nothing here that the new CFO can’t handle, the donation drive prep is complete anyway, maybe you _should_ take some time away and deal with it while you have the opportunity.”

“I don’t know, I’ll have to think about it all.”

Jess nods quietly, making her way back towards Lena’s office door before popping her head inside.

“Best to get it done before the new year, fresh start and all. Goodnight, Miss Luthor.”

“Goodnight, Jess. Thanks again.”

-

As hesitant as Lena is to admit it, her assistant is right.

She’s going to have to get down to Midvale at some point to sort through her supposed aunt’s belongings, deal with the house and get all required legal documents signed, so it might as well be now before the chaos of a new work year begins.

Her palms feel clammy as she sweeps the towering stack of paperwork to the side of her desk and opens up her laptop. Lena hasn’t ever been to Midvale herself, it’s existence was brought to her attention when she saw it listed as her mother’s place of birth on the death certificate. She’d done some research a few years back, looked into the general area and read a little about the town history, but she had found herself feeling strangely choked up. 

She hasn’t been able to revisit it since.

Now though, she’s staring at her newly purchased plane ticket, the words _National City > Midvale _staring right back at her from the screen.

* * *

  
  
  
  


The contrast between home and Midvale is overwhelming from the moment that Lena steps off the plane directly onto a snow-covered runway. 

The airport can barely be classed as a building - she’s seen bigger apartments while on the hunt for one in the city a few years ago. Perhaps most shockingly, the entire thing appears to be made of _wood._ Thick, dark brown slats run from the ground all the way up to the pointed, snowy roof. It looks more like a chalet in Switzerland than an airport in Midvale.

The inside is surprisingly cosy, though. Christmas lights hang proudly in the space where the walls meet the ceiling, draped around the entire baggage area in twinking rows of silver and gold. In the center of the room stands a beautiful Christmas tree - a real one, if the little green needles on the floor are any indication - decked in beautiful baubles and shiny, glittery tinsel.

The entire experience is slightly surreal, it feels as though Lena has flown out of the city and directly into a Hallmark Christmas movie. She’s never seen anything like this before and she hasn’t even collected her luggage yet.

It doesn’t seem like it will take long for her to get it either, there were only _seven_ other people with her on the flight - something that had been such a surprise she’d had to buy in-flight wifi just to let Jess know about it immediately. Shockingly, they don’t have to wait in line at the baggage carousel, there are so few of them that they simply grab their suitcases and move on. Lena sets hers down on the floor after lifting it from the conveyor belt, pulling the handle out so that she can roll it along easily behind her. 

She stays a few steps back from the tiny group of people, quietly following along to where she hopes the exit is located.

It’s strange, they all seem to be familiar with one another - unlike in the city where everyone keeps to themselves, these people seem happy to be interacting. An eldery lady asks a man about his newborn daughter, who in turn asks her about the health of her husband. A little kid is skipping along beside his mother while blabbering excitedly about school to the polite young couple who were sitting in front of Lena on the flight.

When she locates the exit and steps out of the building, the sharp, icy wind feels like an immediate slap in the face. Her skin tingles from the sensation, cheeks immediately turning a shade of pink while her breath forms a white cloud in front of her nose. It’s immediately unlike anything she’s ever experienced and she glances regretfully at her suitcase, realizing that she doesn’t have anything warmer than some fluffy socks packed away inside it.

“Lena Luthor?”

Lena turns at the sound of her own name, locating a dark-haired woman who appears to have called on her. She’s dressed in an incredibly smart three piece suit, covered only a little by the long winter coat draped around her shoulders. She’s standing next to a shiny, black car - one Lena knows must have cost a pretty penny - and she looks entirely out of place given the small town serving as her backdrop.

She approaches the woman, the wheels of her suitcase slipping slightly on the icy concrete beneath her feet as she says, “Yes?’

“Samantha Arias, we spoke on the phone.” She smiles warmly at Lena, extending a hand out for her to shake. “Most people just call me Sam, though. It’s great to meet you.”

“Oh, yes, of course! You’re my aunt’s lawyer, right?”

“Well, sort of,” Sam tells her, gesturing to the passenger’s door of the car. “I’ll explain everything to you, but let’s get you out of the cold first.”

She helps Lena put her suitcase into the trunk before rounding the car and getting into the driver’s seat. The hot air inside is nothing short of heavenly against Lena’s chilled skin and she finds herself resisting the urge to hold her hands up to the vent as she gets comfortable in the fancy leather seat. She settles for closing her thighs around her chilled fingers, allowing the warm air to blow freely against her slightly reddened face.

“There’s a lot of stuff to go through,” Sam explains, pulling the car out onto the road after a quick check in the mirrors. “I’ll take you to the property now and show you around, it’s in perfect condition so you don’t have to worry about booking yourself into a hotel or anything. The caretaker does an excellent job of maintaining the place, the grounds are pristine and you'd be hard-pressed to find so much as a chip in the paint.”

“That’s great,” Lena tells her quietly.

Truthfully though, she’s not really listening to anything that the woman is saying to her. 

There’s a sudden, uncomfortable tightness in her chest and an unpleasant fluttering in her stomach, growing more intense with each passing second. The anxiety that she’d managed to keep at bay during the flight is now resurfacing as the reality sinks in that she’s _here_ , in Midvale, where her mother was born. She’s being driven to the property owned by her aunt, a member of her family she had no idea even existed until a few days ago.

She feels nauseous and the hot air in the car is suddenly too much. She tears off the knitted scarf wrapped around her neck and presses the button on the side of her door to open the window, rolling it all the way down before turning her face towards the incoming wind. The cold air is an incredible shock to her system, providing just what she needs to tear herself away from the edge of the panic attack threatening to overcome her.

“Are you alright? Do you need me to pull over?” Sam’s concerned voice floats towards her ears.

“I’m okay.” Lena assures the woman. “I’m just feeling a little anxious.”

“Understandable.” Sam nods her head, eyes trained on the car in front of them. “This must all be so new to you. I promise that I’ll walk you through every detail and make it as easy as possible. If you have any questions then don’t hesitate to ask.”

“Thank you,” Lena says quietly, feeling oddly thankful for the stranger in the car.

“If you need to stop for a break or anything, please just let me know.” Sam glances over at her for a second, flashing her a comforting smile before turning her attention back to the road ahead.

The car makes a right turn not long after, gliding effortlessly along a narrow, icy track. The sides of the road are lined with snowy trees, so tall that Lena can’t even see the top without leaning forward in her seat. Sam navigates the bends with impressive ease, and before long they emerge in the centre of the most beautiful little town Lena has ever seen. It appears almost from nowhere, the surprising end of a quiet, single-track road. It’s so breathtaking that her anxiety is momentarily forgotten, eyes eager to take in everything that they can.

There are people everywhere - families trailing bags of Christmas shopping along the street, people crowded around a little cart with a banner above that reads _Christmas Hot Chocolate - $1,_ it’s just as busy as the city, but it has a calm, quiet feel to it.

There are Christmas lights hung up on each of the streetlights, alternating flashing images between a snowflake, a reindeer with a red nose and Santa Claus. The store fronts are all adorned with their own lights - some even have trees decorated and propped outside, topped with stars and everything.

The snow has been shoveled away from the pavements, leaving huge piles of it to line the sides of the road. It’s surprisingly white and fresh, so unlike the mushy, dark colored snow lining the streets of the city.

“It’s beautiful, right?” Sam asks, slowing the car down just a little.

“Yeah,” Lena agrees, leaning forward in her seat to get a better look. “I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

“I hadn’t either,” Sam tells her. “My wife grew up here, she moved to National City a few years ago, but we still come back for all of the important holidays. It’s so peaceful, like a whole other world.”

“Wait, you're from the city?” Lena asks, turning her attention back to the woman in the car. “Why are you here dealing with this case?”

“It’s a long story,” Sam says. “I promise I’ll explain everything to you after we get you settled at the inn.”

“What inn?”

“Your aunt’s inn.” She glances over at Lena. “You know, the whole reason you’re here?”

“The property I've inherited is an _inn?_ I was under the impression I’d inherited a house.”

“She lived at the inn, so technically it was her house, but it’s most definitely an inn.”

Lena massages her temples, attempting to relax the muscles before a headache forms. She mumbles, “Jesus.”

It takes barely ten minutes to drive through the town, the enormous Christmas tree lighting up the square only minimally comforts Lena as the reality of what she’s gotten herself into begins to sink in. Sam pulls the car into a beautiful cobblestoned driveway, the end of which leads to a surprisingly modern-looking inn. Truthfully, Lena had immediately been picturing an old, rundown building with outdated curtains and headache inducing patterns on the walls, but this place, from the outside at least, looks clean and welcoming.

“Wow,” she says as Sam pulls the car to a stop at the end of the driveway.

“It’s nice, right? My wife and I actually stayed here a couple times before we moved in together, my mother-in-law’s home is great, but there’s no privacy.”

Despite the anxiety sitting heavily on her chest, a laugh manages to escape from Lena as she opens the door and climbs out.

It feels like she’s drifted off and woken up inside an episode of _Gimore Girls._ The inn has an elegant, white porch wrapped around the entire lower level of the building - true to Sam’s word, there isn’t a single chip or scuff visible on the paint. Beautiful red flowers hang in baskets around the entrance and the impressive bay windows are bordered by twinkling strings of warm, golden lights.

Unfortunately, the inside is slightly less welcoming. The furniture is eerily draped in thick, white sheets and it doesn’t seem like the inn has been up and running for a while. There’s a coldness to the place, one that feels unnatural while being indoors, but Lena supposes the death of the owner will have that effect on the very thing that she was responsible for bringing to life.

“I have the paperwork here for the transfer of the property.” Sam holds up a thin, clear folder. “You can have a read over it and then hand it back to me tomorrow if you’re happy to sign it.”

“Alright, perfect.” Lena nods as she takes the offered papers. She’ll go through everything tonight with her own lawyers over the phone - it’s not that she doesn’t trust Sam, honestly the woman seems lovely, but she’s not willing to risk signing anything without having her own trusted team go through it first. “I still have a lot of questions for you.”

“Of course.” Sam smiles. “I have a lot of information for you, I just wanted you to get in and settled first. The caretaker has been working on the master bedroom, the sheets are fresh and the entire room has been cleaned and dusted for your arrival. If you want to take some time to unpack, or maybe let people know that you arrived safely, you can find me later at the little cafe just down the street. You can’t miss it, it’s called Eliza’s.”

“Okay, perfect,” Lena tells her, feeling grateful for the chance to be alone with her thoughts before dealing with all the legal stuff. “Thank you so much for the ride and everything.”

“It was my pleasure. It’s great to meet you.”

“You too,” Lena says, waving Sam off from the front porch.

* * *

The first thing that she does after closing the door behind Sam is haul her luggage up the pristine, oak staircase. There is a decent amount of space upstairs, Lena would guess maybe six to eight rooms are up here, although she’s unsure how many of the doors may just be storage closets or extra bathrooms. She locates the master bedroom easily - it’s the only one in the hallway with the door open, and there aren’t any white sheets covering the furniture inside.

The bed is a fair size and there’s a beautiful bay window overlooking a lake out at the back of the property. The room smells fresh, as though it’s been aired out and then sprayed down with something pleasant. Overall, it seems like a surprisingly nice place to stay. Lena can definitely see the potential this place has, although it’s clear that it needs a little time and love to restore it to an operational standard.

She can’t shake the lingering feeling that she doesn’t belong here, though. Lena hoped that once she arrived she would feel something familiar, something to prove to herself that she belongs here, that she ever had any connection to a family other than the Luthors, but she doesn’t feel any of that. She feels as though she’s staying in a regular hotel, perhaps on a work trip, definitely not on Christmas break. She even doesn’t bother unpacking her case, she just props it up against the side of the bed and then heads back downstairs to look around. 

Lena steps into what she assumes is the lounge area - there are a few couches and what appears to be a coffee table hiding beneath the creepy, white sheets. The walls are painted a light shade of magnolia, plain and simple, but the paintings and photographs framed on them gives the room a warm feel to it. 

Lena doesn’t want to start removing the dust sheets until it’s necessary - she wants everything to look as pristine as possible so that when the time comes she can sell it on swiftly, and accidentally spilling coffee on the sofa won’t help her with that.

There’s an actual, real-life fireplace on the back wall, complete with a pile of logs inside and everything. She moves to take a closer look, the heels of her boots echoing intimidatingly on the hardwood floor as she walks. 

There’s a little pack of matches and some old newspaper shreddings on the mantelpiece, calling out to her as she picks them up. She’s never started a fire before, the one back in her apartment is entirely electronic, but how hard can it be, right? She’s seen plenty of survival shows where people light fires with far less than the supplies she currently has available to her.

She tears off a few pages of the newspaper and sets them down just beneath the pieces of wood already sitting in the fireplace. Next, she slips a match out of the box and strikes it on the rough side. The flame catches immediately and she tosses it onto the torn newspaper.

It takes a few minutes, but eventually the flames lick their way up towards the kindling, and before she knows it, there’s an actual fire going at the inn. Lena feels oddly proud of herself as she holds her palms out towards the heat.

It’s still so cold inside, she knows she’ll have to figure out the heating system before bed, but for now she is content to watch the mesmerising way that the flames are dancing in front of her eyes - it’s oddly relaxing after feeling so stressed all day, the occasional crackling and popping sounds are like white noise to her ears.

It barely takes a few minutes before she realizes something is wrong. She blinks and suddenly the room is filling up with smoke, _fast._ Thick, dark clouds are billowing out and causing her to cough horribly. Her first instinct is to put fire out, but she has nothing to extinguish the flames with and the smoke is becoming opaque very quickly. She runs towards where she remembers the door being, following the path out into the hallway before she pulls the front door wide and steps out into the snow.

She bends and scoops some up, ignoring the way the cold stings her skin before rushing back inside and dumping it right on top of the flames. They die down immediately, smothered by the heavy, wet heap.

Lena navigates her way over to one of the windows, reaching up on her tiptoes to undo the latch before pushing it open as wide as it’ll go. She takes a gulp of the fresh air before pulling herself away and opening all of the downstairs windows using the same questionable technique.

Thick, dark clouds are pouring out of the inn when she finally steps outside, lungs seizing as they attempt to rid themselves of the smoke she’d accidentally breathed in. The fresh air feels incredible, but her chest feels a little raw. Lena can’t believe she’s been here for less than thirty minutes and already come dangerously close to burning the place to the ground.

She glances up towards the driveway and wonders momentarily if she inhaled more smoke than she originally thought. There’s a- a _goddess_ coming towards her, she has thick, muscular thighs and arms so beefy that Lena aches to be put into a headlock by this sexy, strong, mysterious woman. Her hair is golden, so pretty and wavy, the way it brushes her enormous shoulders makes Lena feel slightly jealous of it.

“What the hell happened?” The woman seems angry, which isn’t a good sign.

“I- um.” Lena shakes her brain free of the fogginess. “Fire.”

“Well obviously,” the woman scoffs, rushing past her to look inside the bay window out front. “Is it out?”

“Yeah, I lit the fire and then I don’t know what happened,” Lena explains. “The room just started filling up with smoke.”

“Did you open the vent?”

“The what?”

“The vent.” She looks incredibly pissed off now, and Lena shies away under her gaze. “The one inside the chimney, you have to open it so that the smoke goes up there. If you don’t then _this_ happens.”

“I didn’t- I didn’t know,” she explains. “I’m new here.”

“Well yes, that much is obvious.”

“I’m sorry, but what the hell is your problem?” Lena snaps, crossing her arms over her chest the same way she does when she’s leading a boardroom meeting and needs to assert her dominance.

“My problem is you,” she snaps right back at her. “I’ve spent years keeping this place in pristine condition, I work my ass off to make sure everything is perfect, and then you come in here and almost set the place alight. It’s going to stink of smoke, I’ll need to have the place totally cleaned out now. I’ll probably need to repaint the walls and replace the carpet to get rid of the smell.”

“Kara?”

Lena turns to see another woman jogging up the driveway, she looks less annoyed and significantly more concerned than the blonde currently glaring at her. She’s carrying what appears to be a first-aid kit and she immediately heads towards Lena.

“Hey, I’m Alex,” she introduces herself with a friendly smile. “Are you alright? Do you mind if I take a quick look at you?”

“What the hell happened?” Another voice catches their attention, and Lena turns to see Sam walking towards them. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Lena assures her.

“Actually, I haven’t checked her over yet,” Alex tells Sam.

“Lena, this is my wife, Doctor Alexandra Danvers.” Sam introduces her. “Please let her make sure that you’re alright.”

“Call me Alexandra one more time and we’ll see how much longer you have a wife,” the woman warns, although Lena sees the smile that they share. She turns back to her and says, “You can call me Alex.”

“Nice to meet you, Alex.”

“You too, Sam says you make a great first impression, although I’m not so sure about that statement.” Alex gestures to the smoke pouring out of the building behind them.

Lena breaths a laugh as Alex fishes a torch out of her kit before instructing her to move her eyes around, she follows the movements with the light and the woman seems content with the results - Lena knows she’s fine, but she supposes it’s nice to have confirmation.

“Okay, you’re all good,” Alex assures her. “Just take it easy, you might experience headaches on and off but they should clear up relatively quickly, just try to stay hydrated.”

“Thank you so much.”

Sam, who had been standing right beside her while Alex checked her over, moves to face Lena. “What on earth happened? I left you alone for like twenty minutes.”

“She lit a fire without opening the vent,” Kara scoffs. She’s been so quiet that Lena had forgotten about her for a lovely second. “The whole place was filled with smoke, she’s lucky she didn’t pass out.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Alex brushes her off before turning to Lena. “That’s Kara, my sister. Just ignore her, she gets all weird and crabby when it comes to this place.”

“How did you guys even know that something was wrong?”

“The smoke alarm.” Sam explains. “Kara was alerted, it’s her job to take care of this kinda thing, and she let us all know.”

“Ah, that makes sense.” Lena nods, looking around at the three women standing in front of her. “Thank you all so much for rushing out here, I’m really sorry for causing such a scene.”

“Why don’t you come back to my mom’s place for a drink? Best coffee in town,” Alex says, and Lena does her best to ignore the glare of disapproval coming from Kara.

“Sure, I’d love to.”

“I’m going to stay here.” Kara gestures to the building behind her. “I’ll get started on clearing the rest of the smoke out, make sure nothing else is damaged.”

* * *

Eliza’s Cafe, where Lena was supposed to be meeting Sam later in the day anyway, is a beautiful little shop right in the center of town. The front is painted a beautiful, bright shade of red, and the sign above the display window is decked out in twinkly lights - it seems the whole town is a fan of them, Lena has seen more in Midvale so far than she’d seen on the Rockefeller Centre Christmas tree a few years back.

The tables inside are each draped with a Christmas themed cloth and there are mini trees stationed around the area, the lights synchronized so that each one changes color at the exact same time. The counter holds an array of insanely delicious looking cupcakes and pastries, partially hidden from view by the holly-adorned garland draped across the length of it.

A blonde woman appears from behind the counter, with a christmas-themed apron wrapped around her waist and a pair of reindeer antlers sitting on top of her slightly mussed blonde hair. Her face lights up the moment that she notices Alex and Sam, immediately beckoning them inside and gesturing to a free table in the back.

“Come in, come in,” she tells them before turning to Lena. “You must be Miss Luthor, it’s lovely to meet you, I’m Eliza.”

“Oh, just Lena is fine, it’s great to meet you.” She smiles, shaking the woman’s hand. Eliza has something about her, she seems to radiate warmth and happiness just by being there. “This place is incredibly beautiful, you don’t see many places like this in the city. You can really tell you put a lot of care into it.”

“Thank you, sweetheart.” Eliza gestures for Lena to sit down at the table where Sam is currently pulling out a laptop. Alex has snuck away behind the counter to steal what appears to be a handful of Christmas cookies from the glass display case. “Now, what can I get for the two of you before you get into all of the important stuff?”

“I’ll take a coffee please.” Sam smiles at the woman before turning her attention back to her laptop.

“I’ll have the same, thank you,” Lena tells her.

Eliza rushes off to get their drinks while Lena slips her coat off and drapes it over the back of her chair. She takes a deep breath as Sam’s eyes leave the screen and look up at her. She says, “Okay, let’s get started.”

The first load of information is mainly about the legalities of taking ownership of the inn and everything inside it. Lena takes notes of everything that Sam is saying to her, highlighting a few parts that she would like to go over with her own lawyers before proceeding. It takes a while for them to get through it all, Eliza continually pops in to refill their mugs with coffee and even slips them a few Christmas cookies as she goes.

“Okay so now we have all of that out the way, there are some other things you need to know.”

“Alright,” Lena responds, setting down the mug she had been taking a sip out of. “Is this why you’ve been so secretive about my aunt?”

“I wouldn’t say I’ve been secr—”

“Every question that I’ve asked you today has been met with ‘oh we’ll talk later,” or ‘let’s get you settled first,’ or some other excuse,” Lena speaks calmly, there’s no venom in her voice, but she also wants Sam to know that she isn’t naive, or someone to be messed around with.

“Okay, you’re right.” Sam admits. “I’m sorry about that. Legally, I had to get the property-related information out of the way first, but now I can tell you everything. I can’t promise this will be easy to hear, though. It’s, uh, it’s a lot to take in.”

“Well then, tell me everything.” Lena sits up in her chair, breathing in deeply through her nose as she tries to calm the sudden spike in her heart rate. “I can handle it, I’m not a child.”

“Your aunt, Flora Elizabeth Kieran, passed away sixteen years ago.”

“Sixteen— _what_?”

“She was your mother’s aunt, so technically your great-aunt. She passed away after a short battle with cancer and she left everything to you, Lena Kieran Luthor. She wrote to you often, she had birthday cards and Christmas notes, letters and photographs, everything. It’s my understanding that your mom and Flora were incredibly close, I believe she even sought custody of you after the passing of your mom, but as you know, Lionel Luthor had paternal rights. The Luthor family forbade Flora from contacting you, they stated it was in your best interest to forget about your old life entirely. You went to Metropolis with the Luthors and she didn’t ever know where you were, but she kept letters like I said, she wrote to you until the very end of her life. The Luthors were informed of her passing, but they fought to keep the news away from you. They agreed that they would inform you of your inheritance upon turning 26, when they deemed you old enough to make your own decision, but they never did. I was hired to legally fulfil her final wishes, to make sure you knew about all of this.”

“I— um,” Lena gasps quietly, desperately wishing that she had better prepared herself for this conversation. Her head is swimming, and every instinct in her body is telling her to _go, get out of here, now._ “Please excuse me for a moment. Is it alright if I— I just need some fresh air.”

The wooden legs of her chair scrape loudly against the floor as Lena stands, grabbing her coat and rushing out of the cafe.

“My heart is breaking for her,” Eliza says to Sam, approaching the table as they watch Lena rush away along the pavement outside the window.

“I know,” Sam agrees. “The whole situation is just heartbreaking. I wish I’d gotten the chance to meet Flora, she sounds like she was a great lady.”

“She was,” Eliza tells her quietly. “One of the greatest women I ever knew. Thank you for doing this Sam, it truly means the world.”

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on twitter - @kashymcgraths <3


End file.
